Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed
by Jade Sabre
Summary: Despite being ruggedly handsome, Alistair sometimes has a problem with following through with the ladies.  Installments vary from humor to angst and a little bit of everything in between.
1. Redcliffe

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** Jakia gave me a drabble prompt and I epically failed at writing drabbles, so here is the first installment. I just recently beat the game and am new to the fandom, so any canon mistakes, etc. that I make are wholly my fault.

Reviews would be awesome!

**Disclaimer:** Dragon Age: Origins and all of its content belongs to the geniuses at Bioware, of whom I am sadly not one, though maybe I will run away to Canada and try my luck.

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**one**

Her name was Milly and she was six months his elder and she swept out the kitchens and he could not for the life of him figure out why she was standing in the door of the stable stall twisting her fingers in her apron. He'd specifically chosen this stall because everyone knew Lady's Mercy was the most misnamed horse in Redcliffe and therefore everyone knew that trying to invade Mercy's stall was madness and therefore no one would come and drag him out and make him talk to Eamon or Teagan or the Revered Mother or those Andraste-humping templars who were waiting for him and maybe humping Andraste while they waited. He wasn't really sure what the insult meant but it felt pretty blasphemous, and maybe if he blasphemed enough they wouldn't want him anymore.

Not that they really wanted him. Not that anyone really wanted him. That was the point, wasn't it?

"Alistair?" Milly said, as if she wasn't sure he was there. "It's Milly, from the kitchens."

Alistair crossed his arms and nestled deeper into his hay and went on praying to Andraste that Mercy's bowels were clear.

"I just…heard you were going away," she said, and between the horse's legs he could see her hands tying knots in her apron string. "I wanted to give you something. For luck."

Luck. Like he'd ever had luck in his life. He'd been born fundamentally lacking, and recent events only served to magnify that fact.

"Alistair, are you going to come out?" She waited, and he didn't move a muscle, not even when Mercy lifted her tail like maybe her bowels weren't so clear. Or maybe she just wanted Milly gone as much as he did.

Milly sighed, and said, "Well, here it is," and one of her hands disappeared from sight and he heard a smacking sound, and then she said, "It only counts if you catch it," but he didn't try to catch it and nothing landed near him and so he assumed she was making fun of him, like throwing an invisible bone at a mabari pup. He didn't take the bait.

She stood there a moment more, and finally said, "Well…goodbye," and then she carefully shut Mercy's door—how she'd gotten into the stall was a mystery—how she'd know he was in the stall was a mystery too—and all he could see was the stall door, hay, and a horse, and all he could do was wonder what he'd missed.


	2. Chantry

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** Dear Dragon Age fandom, y'all are the nicest, most welcoming people ever, and I am so glad to have finally joined you. I hope you like the update, and I always love to here from my readers. :-)

**Disclaimer:** Dragon Age: Origins and all of its content belongs to the geniuses at Bioware, of whom I am sadly not one, though maybe I will run away to Canada and try my luck.

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**two**

"I don't like this," thirteen-year-old Alistair said, but Garrott waved in his general direction from where he crouched, his eye peering through the hole in the wooden wall.

"You'll like it more once it's your turn to look," his friend and fellow potscrubber—otherwise known as a miserably-failing templar-in-training—said. Garrott wasn't an Andraste-humper so much as an admirer of the female form due to its being the one that Andraste inhabited during her earthly life. He claimed he was just doing as the Maker had done, although Alistair sincerely hoped, for the sake of the Andrastian Chantry, that the Maker had never reduced Himself to watching through peepholes while Andraste bathed.

"I don't want a turn," Alistair said for the hundredth time, and Garrott took his eye off whatever was on the other side of the wall long enough to shush him. He lowered his voice, looking up and down the narrow alley in which they stood, sandwiched between the wooden fence for the women's baths and the wooden wall of the women's dormitory. "We're going to get caught."

"Only if you keep making such a racket," Garrott said. "Relax. I've done this plenty of times—it's the best way to pick out which of the initiates to talk to during prayers."

Alistair couldn't deny that it would be nice to have someone new to talk to—most of the other templars-in-training were serious about Andraste and the Maker and the idea that All Mages Were Evil or at least Prone To Evilness, and they didn't appreciate Garrott's musings on Andraste's smallclothes or Alistair's penchant for off-key chanting. Three years in the Chantry had taught him that they didn't actually care so much for his singing ability as for his ability to memorize the Chant, but that, too, he found boring. Combat training was much more exciting, but it was always interrupted by lectures about keeping the Maker's will in mind whilst striking down abominations. Chanting off-key was a minor offense, but it was his revenge for making him sit through so many boring activities. Garrott, being older, had promised to teach him more ways to cause trouble, but Alistair had hoped they would be _interesting_, not…dirty.

"Maker's prick, take a look at this one," Garrott breathed, tugging at Alistair's trousers. "I didn't think they let girls with those kinds of—"

"I _don't want to look_," Alistair hissed, yanking his leg away.

"Are you a man or not?" Garrott asked, and Alistair opened his mouth to protest when he looked up and she was standing ten feet away from them, hands on _naked_ he looked from her feet to her face and skipped the in-between bits and said, "I—beg your pardon?"

"I thought I saw an eye in the old peephole," the girl-no-woman-young-woman? _shut up shut up shut up_ said, and thank the Lady she sounded amused, not angry, and anyway he wasn't the one peeping. "Ah, Garrott, corrupting the young recruits again? Tell me boy," and her smiling brown eyes were measuring his face and he concentrated on her nose, "is everyone that color in your homeland?"

"He_ is_ from Redcliffe," Garrott said, standing slowly, probably not skipping from her feet to her face but Alistair didn't want to look to check. "Ingra, may I present to you Alistair? Alistair, this is Ingra, the most free-thinking initiate the sisterhood has to offer."

"Pleased to meet you," Alistair said, still staring at her nose, and she laughed.

"He's cute," she said, and a drop of water on her nose fell to the ground and his traitorous eyes thought it would be okay to watch its progress, but it was _not_ okay, and he stared at the ground instead. "He'll be quite the heartbreaker in a few years."

"I thought I'd take him under my wing early," Garrott said cheerfully. "Ingra could teach you a great deal, Alistair, if you'd care to learn."

"Um," Alistair said, and Ingra laughed again, and he thought wildly that she was doing a very good job of teaching him all sorts of things he would have to sort out with—a cold bath? Was that what the Master Chanter had advised? He thought perhaps that would be a good idea, much better than standing here while she took his chin in her hand and lifted his head until their eyes met.

"A little young yet, I think," Ingra said, releasing his chin. She pressed her fingertips to her lips and then to his forehead, and said, "Maker's breath, but you're a lovely shade of red."

"It's just a—blush," he blurted, but now his entire body was on fire, and it had little to do with the fact that there was a naked woman standing in front of him and more to do with his desire to curl into a tiny ball and die.

"Yes well, go cool off," Garrott said. "I'll see you later, all right?"

Ingra made a—_noise_—Alistair fled without saying goodbye, running in a blind panic towards the ice water in the bathhouse, and slowing down only when he realized the screams meant he had run into the women's baths instead. Shouts for the Revered Mother accompanied a large number of wet towels covering his head, and when the screaming stopped he dared to lift a towel off his head, only to discover that the Revered Mother's prompt appearance was due entirely to the fact that she had been in the baths as well.


	3. Denerim

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** In which I attempt not to name any other Grey Wardens, and fail miserably. (Naming characters almost always involves inventing _backstories_ for them, and next thing you know, your fic is three times the size of a long drabble and still growing. Oops.)

I'm sorry about the delay in getting this up; I just moved across the country and don't have stable internet yet. I will do my best to keep updating!

Also, once again, I love reviews, lots and lots. (Of love. For reviews. Especially lots of them.)

**Disclaimer:** Dragon Age: Origins and all of its content belongs to the geniuses at Bioware, of whom I am sadly not one, though maybe I will run away to Canada and try my luck.

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**three**

Being a man, Alistair concluded, was pretty great.

It helped that he was surrounded by other men who had mostly come to the same conclusion. Granted, they had also all come to the conclusion that within the next thirty years all of them would be dead, but that simply added spice to life. In between staring at maps while Duncan tried to hammer into his head the current political situation—something he'd been mercifully free of in the Chantry, and perhaps its only redeeming quality—and learning the best techniques for killing darkspawn, there was plenty of time for drinking and telling jokes with bodily humor as punch lines and making comments about each other's sisters. Ribald tales abounded too, of course, though most of them ended with the teller fighting darkspawn without his pants on and earning the eternal gratitude of whichever buxom lass happened to be standing nearby. It was a refreshing, welcome change from the Chantry, and even though he'd only been there for a month, the Grey Warden hall in Denerim felt more like home than anywhere he'd ever been before.

Of course, as one of the two new guys, he was called upon to make a fool of himself from time to time, but the first time he fell flat on his face was when they asked him for _his_ stories. "Stories?" he said.

"Sure," said one of the larger, louder Wardens sitting down the table from him. "You've got looks and you must have charm, so surely you've saved a lass or two in your day."

While Alistair tried to discern the potential layers of innuendo in this statement, another man said, "Lay off the boy. It's not like the Chantry wants its recruits dropping their pants for the Revered Mothers."

"They don't?" someone else called, and Alistair blanched.

"Of course not, they're all hags," the larger Warden said.

"That's not strictly true," Alistair said, uncomfortably aware than anything he said would be heard throughout the entire mess hall and then repeated to anyone with the misfortune to be absent.

"Ah," said his original persecutor, a dark redhead named Mattin, leaning forward. "So you _do_ have a girl in mind."

"Uh, yes," he said, trying to come up with a story that would be the right mixture of hilarity and vagueness. "A pretty girl, even. Trapped within the cruel confines of Chantry law, waiting for me to rescue her."

"And did you?"

"Let the boy tell his story, Gerd," Mattin said, and the larger Warden leaned back, his arms crossed.

Alistair felt the sweat starting to bead on his forehead. As a boy, he'd had no trouble telling wild tales; even in the Chantry, he'd been banished to the pots more than once for telling falsehoods. But these men were _professionals_, and he'd seen what they'd done to some of the other men who had attempted to push the boundaries of suspended disbelief. Eventually the thread would snap, and some poor soul would be standing on a table wearing only his smallclothes and howling poetry about how Queen Anora's eyes sparkled like moonlit diamonds. Which would be uncomfortable on too many levels to think about, and so he opened his mouth and said, "Well, no, because it turned out she had actually pledged herself on purpose, and quite objected to my attempts to help her sneak out by showing up in her room while she was dressing for morning prayers. Can't imagine why." He shrugged, and then added (with only a twinge of guilt), "If I were her, I would've left quickly—her breasts were much larger than any of those statues of Andraste, and the last thing you'd want would be to draw the Maker's attention away from his prophet."

He waited, as he always did when saying one of Garrott's blasphemies, but no lighting bolts came; only the thunder from Gerd slapping a hand on his back and laughing. "So what you're saying," Mattin said, under the other man's guffaws, "is that you don't have any stories."

Alistair blushed against his will and clamped his mouth shut, grinning up at Gerd instead. Mattin leaned back in his chair and called, "Willem!"

At this a tall, lanky Warden, strong-armed and bright-eyed, stood and sauntered over to their table. Upon closer inspection he had a scar running down his left temple, but since the wound so obviously should have killed him and yet he was so obviously alive, it only had the effect of making him look tough and heroic instead of ugly and maimed. Alistair gulped, and Mattin said, "I think we need to show Alistair the sights of the city," and Willem nodded, and Gerd clapped the newest Warden on the back, and Alistair began to wish he had voted for the smallclothes option instead.

**o-o-o**

"Showing Alistair the sights of the city" seemed to entail "letting Alistair go first as he wanders shady-looking back alleys while wearing nothing but a tunic and his smallclothes" as well as "laughing when the bandits wolf-whistled instead of attacked." Granted, the presence of three fully armed Grey Wardens at his back no doubt diffused their aggression, but he was afraid that some of it was actual interest, and Maker knew he wasn't—um, interested. At all.

"I'd say he's taking it rather well, wouldn't you?" Mattin said behind him, but Alistair didn't dare look. The other men had a habit of poking him with real, non-metaphorical swords if he stopped paying attention to his surroundings.

"Very well," Gerd said. He'd whistled himself, making Alistair even more nervous, but he'd assured the younger man he never bothered with fellow Wardens. "He seems downright used to it. Don't they dress you in the Chantry?"

Alistair bit his tongue rather than say something about sleeping with dogs and not owning a proper pair of pants until Isolde showed up and demanded the bastard develop _some _decency. His legs were cold and his boots were covered in stuff better left to the imagination—much, much worse than anything he'd tromped through in a pigsty. The quiet _chink_ of armor behind him only intensified his self-pity, and he crossed his arms tighter and said, "Left or right?"

"Left," Willem said, his voice bored. He was some bann's second son and was the next-newest Warden in the group and Alistair wasn't jealous of the fact that Willem was handsomer but he _was _jealous of the fact that Willem got to clean his fingernails while he stumbled through the muck. Another group of lowlifes hiding in the shadows whistled and cat-called, and he wasn't even sure what half of those things even _meant_, and anyway if some of them were referring to what he thought they were referring to he was quite sure they were lying, because the cold and general sense of public humiliation had shriveled up what was left of his, er…wares?

He was so busy glowering that he nearly knocked over the sudden short person in his path; stumbling, he hit the alley wall and came away with soot and Maker knew what else on his tunic while a chipper voice with a flat accent said, "Willem, _darling_."

"Margni," Willem said, still cool. "Alistair, apologize to Margni."

Alistair looked down and found himself looking at a dwarf woman wearing about as much clothing as he was. "Er—sorry," he said. "It's dark, and I have terrible night vision—"

"Oh, _Willem_," cooed another voice, and a human woman detached from the shadows, not so much wearing clothing but cloth artfully arranged around her curves. She circled Alistair before standing next to Margni, tilting her head. "He's a handsome one."

"I only bring the best," Willem said.

Gerd laughed. "What's Mattin doing here, then?"

"Stuff it," Mattin said, followed by what was probably an expletive or two, but Alistair was too busy squealing at the cool touch of a hand on his arm.

"Very 'andsome," said a girl with dark hair and an Orlesian accent. "I sink I vould like a bite, no?"

Alistair firmly fixed his gaze on the alley wall, even as he felt another hand running up into his hair and yet another on his arm and lots and lots of female voices all around him—smooth, deep, sultry, soft, tinged with breath, and so very very unlike the straight loud chantings of the Revered Mother and her initiates, let alone the words that slipped from between their lips, _handsome_ and _me first_ and _oh my_ and _yes please_. It was hard to feel cold with so many bodies around him, but what little pride he had left he focused on his _head _and not anywhere else and he said, quite clearly, "Please back off."

The press of curves disappeared, and the Orlesian stepped up to him, taking his chin in her hand and pressing until his mouth opened and his lips made a funny fish face that he was certain couldn't possiblybe attractive. "You are sure," she said, and the breath from her voice touched his lips, so cold it burned, "you would not like a taste?"

Her breath smelled of apples, and he did like apples, and he did like _her_, but this was wrong, not just Chantry-wrong but people-wrong, duty-wrong, and so he reached up and pried her hand off his face and kissed it, gallantly. "Quite sure, thank you very much," he said, releasing her, and the sighs of all the girls fluttered around him.

"Really, _really_ sure?" Mattin said, sliding up between two of them and putting his arms around them.

"This is your chance," Gerd added, although he was alone.

"Oh come," said Willem, taking Margni's arm in his hand, "leave the boy alone. He's made up his mind."

Alistair glowered at him. "Yes, thank you, you can all go away now."

To his surprise, they did; the women melting back into the shadows, Willem and Margni slipping into a door he hadn't realized was there, Mattin with his lips on one girl's ear while the other giggled, Gerd stumbling into the walls as he went around the corner—probably the corner where the boys were hiding. Alistair felt a tight knot in his chest ease, and his back straightened with the knowledge that he'd made the right choice, done right by the girls (even if everyone else wanted to do wrong by them) and by himself. Sure, the Revered Mother would probably be _proud _of him, which wasn't something he thought often, but the warm swell of satisfaction made up for any lingering horror on his rebellious side. Yes, he had done well tonight. He deserved to go change into clean clothes, maybe even sink into a bath, the curl up under the nice warm blankets in his nice warm bed in the Grey Warden hall, which was right—

Right—

"Um," came a lone voice, thin and high-pitched with hysteria, floating above the muck of the dark back alleys of Ferelden's capital, "a little help please? I seem to be lost."


	4. Blight

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** So, I renamed the chapters to reflect where they take place, to give some kind of continuity or something, I suppose. The fic is sort of pyramidal—the last chapter was the longest, and now we're on the back slope and things go a bit…downhill.

**Disclaimer:** Dragon Age still doesn't belong to me. Whoopsies.

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**four**

Alistair was beginning to realize he'd never really known a _girl_ before.

When he'd been a child, Lady Isolde had been a flowery, overdressed blot on his life, all glares and cutting words and out-of-my-kitchens, and he'd been glad to turn his back on her. The Chantry had the Revered Mother, but he'd only seen her when he was in particularly deep trouble; she had stern looks and a sharp voice that mellowed when she sang the Chant, but he'd never really spent _time_ with any of the women at the Chantry. When the templars did mingle with the sisters, it was usually in the line at the mess hall or during holy celebrations, and those weren't exactly good times to try to talk to one pretty intended while she praised the Maker with her fellows. The girls at the Chantry clumped together, and even if he had _wanted _to single out one of them, he was pretty sure the others in the clump would do their utmost to protect her.

From what he could gather, things were quite different in the Circle of Magi. Boys and girls all shared the open dormitories, although they had separate bathhouses, but nothing ever happened; everyone knew the templars were watching, and that tended to kill any stirrings of the libido brought about by sleeping with a pretty girl's perfume in your nose. It was no wonder the mages threw themselves into their books and their magic; it resembled the way in which the templars conducted their battle training. Except the girl mages and the boy mages all spent time together, and knew how to interact with each other, while the templars were all nervous fuddy-duddies who choked on their tongues.

None of this helped him to talk to his fellow Grey Warden, who certainly fell under the category of "pretty girl" but also under "comrade" and "only other hope for saving Ferelden if not all of Thedas," and when he thought of her in those ways, he found conversation with her fairly easy. And she was quiet and focused and didn't really talk outside of such conversations, at least in the beginning, and so they got along well enough. Morrigan drew her out with questions about the Circle, and riled him up with insinuations about his intelligence, and the ensuing chatter filled their travel to Lothering. Sten didn't talk much, but Leliana seemed to take great delight in dancing verbal circles around him, and although he'd never admit it Zevran provided a pretty good example of how to talk to women…assuming he didn't actually _care_ about the woman to whom he spoke.

Which was exactly the problem—he cared about her, and it had snuck up on him, wormed its way through the chinks in his armor, and now he didn't know what to _do_ when she flopped down on the grass next to him and asked questions, because he couldn't tell if her interest was merely friendly or—or something more, and he'd never met a woman where he _wanted _it to be something more, and finally he gave up and told himself that the only way to find out was to ask.

"Um," he said, having lured her into the privacy of the trees near camp and now finding himself subjected to an amused expression and crossed arms, "I was just thinking, about the tragedy and the death and the Blight and the battles, and I was wondering…" _Suave_, he told himself, but he didn't think it was working. "If you would miss it, when it's over."

"Will you?" she asked, which was _not_ what she was supposed to say, and he waved his hands, searching for an answer.

"Well, I mean, it's what I was trained to do, the fighting anyway," he said. "But it's easier when you're here."

She smiled at that, her brow wrinkling with confusion, and so he took a deep breath and clarified. "I…look, I know you think I'm crazy, and so this sounds crazy, but I care about you," _so, so much_, "a great deal, and I just…I can't tell if, maybe, if I'm fooling myself, or if maybe you…"

She stopped him, then, a hand against his lips, her face settling into a fondness he didn't like. "Alistair," she said, and he was still, because her voice _made _him calm, because her fingers were resting on his lips and she wasn't laughing at him. "I like you. I really do."

"That doesn't sound good," he said, surprised at how steady he sounded.

She wasn't immune to the movement of his lips against her hand, but she pressed her fingers more firmly against them, asking silence. "It's not _bad_," she said. "It's not that, if I thought I could, I wouldn't let you keep talking and sweep me off my feet, but I'm a mage, and Eamon wants to make you king." Her eyebrows quirked in warning when he tried to open his mouth, and she said, "I know you're going to tell me that there's a lot of time between now and then, and that maybe it would be worth it to take what we can in that time, but I…I have to remember who I am, _what_ I am, and Alistair, there are few things more vulnerable in this world than a broken-hearted mage."

He'd never heard her say so much at one time, and she was apologizing and _sad_ and he could feel that tiny part of him that _cared_ folding back into itself, curling up inside behind the humor and the sadness, waiting for its next opportunity. Her eyes searched his face, and her hand dropped away; the air was cold against his lips, but he tried to smile at her all the same. "I understand," he said, and he did; he didn't like it, but she was nothing if not determined, and he couldn't help but love—no, _respect_ her commitment to duty.

She sighed as if she didn't believe him, and said, "Thank you." They stood quietly for a moment, the forest around them still save the chirping of crickets, and then she mustered up another smile and said, "Well, we should be getting back to camp before people start getting the wrong impression."

"You go ahead," he said. "I'll…scout."

She touched his hand, then brushed by, heading for the flickering light of the campfire; he looked into the darkness, and tried not to care.


	5. Wedding

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed (Wedding)

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** Again, apologies for the delay; I had to replace my hard drive, and then I posted my entry for the Seven Heavenly Virtues of Loghain, and I don't like cluttering people's inbox with new fic (although I guess people themselves don't mind it so much), and so here, a few days later, Part 5 in the immortal series.

Thanks so much for all the reviews!

**Disclaimer:** I still don't own Bioware! Though I'm totally naming my Lady Hawke Isabeau.

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**five**

He'd been to a wedding or two in his time, but nothing had prepared him for his own, standing in front of thousands of Ferelden's finest while he promised to protect and cherish their beloved queen. Not that he wasn't beloved too—hero of the Blight (the real hero gone, searching for their Grey Warden brethren, and he wished he was with her), born of Maric's blood, and helplessly handsome to boot. None of this endeared him to the queen, however; he knew she was comparing him to her dead husband in her mind, and the ways in which he wasn't lacking were the ways in which she couldn't control him. It wasn't particularly pleasing, but the other Warden had assured him that he could do it—had not-quite-ordered, not-quite-begged him to work it out for the good of Ferelden, and he owed her that much, at least.

The Grand Cleric recited the bits of the Chant concerned with marriage—in context, many of them were about Andraste's loyalty to Maferath, and everyone knew how well _that_ had turned out—and he looked at Anora not-looking at him and tried not to wish he was anywhere else. His bride was beautiful, yes, but it was an icy, aloof beauty, and the knowledge that he would have to try to shatter her barriers filled him with unease. He'd fought darkspawn and blood mages and faced an archdemon, but the resentment in her eyes was the first truly insurmountable foe he'd faced. Her hands curled into fists within his grasp as the Grand Cleric sang the vows of binding, and then it was done, and he tried not to panic as she said, with an ironic lift to her voice, "You may kiss the bride."

Anora lifted her head, but when he gingerly bent towards her lips she slipped past him, her cheek bumping his in what might look like a kiss, her voice soft in his ear: "Touch me tonight, and I will kill you."

He swallowed, and whispered back, "Assuming I'd want to, which is generous."

He felt her cheek tighten with a smile. "Well-played, my king," and part of him suddenly _did _want to, but she was drawing away and the Grand Cleric was presenting them, King Alistair and Queen Anora. He squeezed her hands and then released them; she gave him a quizzical look, but he turned to his people—_their_ people—and raised his arms, and was glad to let their cheers drown out the fears in his mind, for a time.


	6. Epilogue:  and one time he was

**Title:** Five Times Alistair Wasn't Kissed (and one time he was)

**A****uthor:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** Surprise! I couldn't leave our poor boy hanging, so here is an extra-special bonus chapter.

Anyway, thanks so much for all your reviews; this won't be my last DA fic by a longshot, and I look forward to hanging around the fandom for many moons to come. :-)

**Disclaimer:** Dragon Age still doesn't belong to me, alas.

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**and one time he was**

It was late and he was cozy in his study, the fire crackling and the candlelight illuminating a letter from the Wardens in Orlais, the last bit of reading he had to do before bed. Dog Jr., sired by the darkspawn-slayer of yore, rested at his feet, and he smiled as he perused tales of the new recruits' antics. His wife and children—two boys, mercifully showing no sign of a taint—were already in bed, and Anora would no doubt scold him if he joined her with cold feet; he wriggled them under Dog Jr.'s heavy body, the mabari growling even after he stopped flexing his toes. Dog Jr.'s head lifted, ears pricked, and Alistair reached down to scratch them, and a cool voice said, "Alistair Theirin?"

He turned his head, battle reflexes tensing; a girl leaned against the closed door of his study, her face in shadow, her hair glinting gold. "Yes?" he said, and then, "How did you get in here?"

"'Twasn't hard," she said, her head turning, revealing her hair to be long and unbound. "A nice room, though Mother was right about the stone. The ceiling seems so…_heavy_."

"Uh-huh," he said, watching as she moved around the perimeter of the room, picking up the odds and ends he had scattered on the tables: his collection of figurines found on his journeys, an old ball of string that Dog had so lovingly retrieved to show his affection, gifts from friends sent since his coronation, drawings his sons had made of their father's exploits. Her fingers lingered on the old dried rose—his reminder, on days when Anora wouldn't listen and the nobles' selfishness tried his last nerve, that beauty can be found in the darkest of places—and then she stepped closer into the light, and looked at him.

His first thought was that her clothing was _practical_—revealing, yes, but the band around her chest _fit_ rather than clinging to her form as an affront to common sense, her dragonscale leggings dark and supple, her boots sturdy, a familiar piece of wood slung across her back. He was more surprised when he studied her face, at how _familiar_ she looked, how proud he was without even thinking about it. Her eyes were her mother's gold, but her hair and her smile were _him_, and the latter shyly grew as he stared at her in wonder.

"I suppose I should apologize for surprising you," she said, her voice oddly stiff. "But I'm sixteen and I decided it was high time that we meet, even though Mother told me not to, and so here I am."

"Rebellion runs in your blood," he assured her, and the stiffness in her manner belied the look in her eyes, the look he recognized, had felt himself, wondering if it had actually been a good idea to seek out his sister and try to establish a _family_. "Have you…did you travel long?"

"Oh, very long," she said, her mother's dismissal in her voice. "'Twasn't hard, though, and I knew exactly where I was going."

"And here you are," he said, wonder in his voice.

"And here I am," she said, and then she added, girlish hesitance creeping into the assurance born of, well, bearing an archdemon's soul, "Father."

His grin nearly split his face and he jumped to his feet and pulled her into a hug; years of regret, hiding in the back of his mind, of wondering if he had done the right thing, melted away as he held her close, and his daughter slowly put her arms around him, and then stood on tiptoe and kissed him on the cheek and said, "I'm glad we've met."

"Me too," he said, and kissed the top of her head.


End file.
